[lit-ideas] What Pigden Ought To Say
- From: "" <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> (Redacted sender "Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx" for DMARC)
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 3 Sep 2014 19:37:50 -0400
Or Is To Say.
-- what it is ought to be.
-- What ought to be is.
In a message dated 9/3/2014 5:50:25 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx writes:
The above is an unclear and invalid argument against the so-called
"naturalistic fallacy". It fails to show that even a "vacuous" "ought" may be
derived or deduced from an "is". Leaving Hume's views (and G.E. Moore's)
aside,
we can defend a version of the "naturalistic fallacy" that would insist
there is never a logically valid deduction of an "ought" from an "is": what
we may do is deduce an "ought" from an "ought" but never from an "is", and
it always a confusion to suggest otherwise. Let us say we have a situation
where what "ought" to be the case is also what "is" the case: for example,
that not only should Paul repay Peter the money he borrowed but also it is
the case that Paul repays Peter - from all this, can we now "deduce" that
what is the case here also "ought" to be the case? Yes, but in saying this
we have not deduced the "ought" from any "is" but from another "ought": the
fact Paul repays Peter is not a fact from which we can deduce that Paul
ought to repay Peter; rather from the "ought" that "Paul should repay Peter"
we can deduce that "Paul repays Peter" is what ought to be the case. In this
kind of deduction there is no deduction of an "ought" from an "is". The
quoted passage fails to give any clear or cogent argument showing that some
sort of "vacuous" "ought" may be deduced or derived from some "is". Having
failed in this, we need not take seriously any suggestion that the passage
offers any serious alternative to the view that an "ought" can never be
derived from an "is". It should be emphasised that this version of the
"naturalistic fallacy" is compatible with claims that what "ought" to be the
case
may be conditional on certain facts:- as long as we recognise these claims
are themselves "oughts" and never are "oughts" deduced or derived from
facts. What may happen is that certain views [e.g. certain forms of
utilitarianism] assert that what "ought" may be established by certain facts
[e.g.
what "ought" = what in fact produces 'the greatest pleasure for the greatest
number']. Proponents of such views may lose sight of the fact that their
assertion here is not itself an assertion of non-moral fact but an "ought". In
this way, they may disguise that such claims - that what "ought" may be
defined in terms of certain facts - are never claims that are provable by
facts or derivable from facts*, but are always an "ought" (however
well-disguised or embedded in factual talk). Donal -- *Even if we could show
it was in
fact the case that "something" would produce 'the greatest pleasure for
the greatest number', that would never show that "something" is what ought to
be the case. And what ought to be the case could not be deduced or derived
from any such merely non-moral factual demonstration.
We are considering an online passage by Pigden brought to our attention by
Palma -- from "Philosophy Now" -- where 'now' is an indexical, and becomes,
in reported speech, "Then".
Pigden now (then?) writes:"
"Why then is No-Ought-From-Is important?"
Cfr. Why is Important Important? As Virginia Woolf said, "When people find
something important, I don't."
----
Pigden goes on:
"The answer is that it isn’t as important as many philosophers take it to
be."
And so Virginia Woolf was right.
"Like many truisms it acquires its importance by being denied."
This reminds me of Lewis Carroll: important, unimportant.
----
`What do you know about this business?' the King said to Alice.
`Nothing,' said Alice.
`Nothing whatever?' persisted the King.
`Nothing whatever,' said Alice.
`That's very important,' the King said, turning to the jury. They were just
beginning to write this down on their slates, when the White Rabbit
interrupted: `Unimportant, your Majesty means, of course,' he said in a very
respectful tone, but frowning and making faces at him as he spoke.
`Unimportant, of course, I meant,' the King hastily said, and went on to
himself in an undertone, `important--unimportant-- unimportant--important--'
as if he were trying which word sounded best.
Some of the jury wrote it down `important,' and some `unimportant.' Alice
could see this, as she was near enough to look over their slates; `but it
doesn't matter a bit,' she thought to herself.
----
Pigden goes on:
"If someone proclaims that the sun won’t rise every day unless we rip out
the hearts of sacrificial victims it is worth insisting on the truism the
sun rises every day whatever we do. Similarly, if someone proclaims that they
can logically deduce moral conclusions from non-moral premises, it is
worth insisting on the truism that you can’t get an ‘ought’ from an ‘is’.
Otherwise perhaps not."
So Pigden is having in mind, I trust, Utilitarianism. For G. E. Moore, if
not Hume, for this would be 'avant-la-lettre', was fighting against the
naturalistic fallacy of the utilitarians.
I.e. the distinction between:
i. We do what achieves the greatest happiness for the greatest number.
and
ii. We OUGHT to do what achieves the greatest happiness for the greatest
number.
Hume is historically less important than G. E. Moore, for in Hume's time,
EVERYBODY (that was anybody philosophically) was more or less a naturalist
when it came to ethics (and this since Aristotle). Perhaps Spinoza tried
otherwise with his 'more geometrico'.
I know Locke was NOT a naturalist, and perhaps Hume should have read Locke
more carefully (after all, he is catalogued as a British empiricist along
with Locke and Berkeley).
"Ought" was R. M. Hare's favourite modal.
Hampshire preferred "should".
And H. Paul G. preferred, 'must', for 'must' incorporates, metaphorically,
the level of necessity that a Kantian such as he was should deal with.
It's still different with Witters, and Popper.
Cheers,
Speranza
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